God cannot be known by the outgoing faculties, by the intellect or the vital airs called the pranas. He can be known only by the soul: like alone can know the like. When is the soul liberated? When it is analysed from mind and the outgoing faculties.

Reincarnation

Q. Do you think my hus­band who passed away last May has rein­car­nated yet?

A. It does not fall within the pur­view of sacred teach­ings to dis­cuss or dis­close the Divine dis­po­si­tion about the rein­car­na­tion of those souls who have passed away. Suf­fice it to under­stand that unions and sep­ar­a­tions in this phys­i­cal plane are veiled and gov­erned by the inex­or­a­ble law of karma. There is noth­ing ‘premature’ as the Divine machin­ery works with metic­u­lous pre­ci­sion and noth­ing hap­pens hap­haz­ardly, although it may look to us as such. Just as a man stand­ing at the power-house can see quite dis­tinctly as to how the small­est cogs and spin­dles are work­ing, but the per­son who can­not look beyond these small units can­not under­stand as to how these are being oper­ated by the Divine will of the Lord. Rein­car­na­tion is a spir­i­tual phe­nom­e­non which can­not be under­stood ade­quately by lim­ited human intel­lect.

Q. How does rein­car­na­tion fig­ure numer­i­cally? For instance in plant and insect life, does each flower or bug have an indi­vid­ual soul? What about a worm that divides itself, or a cutting from a plant or tree that takes root and becomes another plant or tree? What is the expla­na­tion regard­ing soul in each case?

A. The entire uni­verse is hum­ming with one life impulse call it as one may. Each flower and each fruit when on the par­ent tree or shrub is acti­vated by the self-same life prin­ci­ple, but when it is plucked or falls down, it begins to shrivel up and decays. But the life con­cen­trated in the tiny seed at the core remains intact and once again springs up into form and col­our when the seed is sown in proper soil and nur­tured care­fully. Sim­i­larly the freshly cut-branch when engrafted or trans­planted from one soil to the other, car­ries with it its power to grow anew with the sus­te­nance it draws from nature. It is only the forms and col­ours that change and not the life prin­ci­ple which remains eter­nally the same. Some worms, when cut into two, retain the life cur­rent just for a while and even­tu­ally it dis­ap­pears.

Q. In ‘Spir­i­tual Gems’ page 313 it says: ‘When spirit is at­tached to Naam, it draws one toward itself and the door is opened. Until this hap­pens, no one need think he can get in.’ Please explain if one does not get ‘through the door,’ but desires never to rein­car­nate but does one’s best, even if it is only a ‘widow’s mite’, need one rein­car­nate?

A. The account of those who have received ini­ti­a­tion is in the hands of the Mas­ter from the time of ini­ti­a­tion. If a dis­ci­ple after ini­ti­a­tion keeps faith with an intense love and strong long­ing for the Mas­ter, does not fall into bad hab­its and does not com­mit foul deeds; but has not, due to adverse cir­cum­stances, or for some other rea­sons, been able to give full time to the spir­i­tual prac­tices, he is, after death made to stay at some inter­me­di­ate stage to com­plete Bha­jan and Sim­ran before he is even­tu­ally taken upwards. Rebirth is only for those who lost their faith, go in actual oppo­si­tion to the instruc­tions of the Mas­ter or who do foul deeds and have very low desires and gross worldly ten­den­cies. That pan of the scales goes down which is over­loaded, and not the other, is the law.